Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Crochet Reading Charts

From time to time, I find invaluable helps and how to's from sources such as websites and other blogs that I follow, and I like to pass on the information. Creations by Valorie does the same, and has passed on this information through her blog. I am following suit.

Reading charts for crochet is one such skill I myself am in need of perfecting, and this helpful chart is reader friendly and a great place to start! Thank you Val and Catarina!

Reading Crochet Charts by Catarina

Hi!

My name is Catarina and today will go thru our first lesson on how to read Crochet Charts.

I don’t know what is the easiest way to start this as I have never been taught this. I just got used to reading them on my own, as most of the crochet patterns in Portuguese magazine come with a chart.

But let’s start with the symbols. Every chart comes with a legend so you know what it represents, but they are kind of universal and here they are:

Crochet Chart Symbols

Sometimes you may find a chart online that doesn’t have a legend or that the symbols are a bit different from the list above. Well that is a problem that arises when the pattern does not include it's own legend. Sometimes you can read them; sometimes you can’t. So far it has just happened for me once that I couldn’t follow a pattern in chart form.

Please don’t get overwhelmed with all these symbols, you don’t really need to know them by heart, as you can always go back to your legend and see what they mean.

So let’s do a pattern reading from a simple chart, this time from a granny square, as I think almost everyone know how to do them or at least understands their construction.

So, as you can see this chart has a legend, and the stitches used for this pattern are chain, double crochet and slip stitch.

In this case we know that granny square starts from middle, but sometimes you don’t know how the pattern you are going to do is suppose to work out, but there are some small things that will help you. Some patterns have a small arrow indicating the pattern first stitch, and other’s have numbers in rows (like this one), indicating what is that row so you just have to look for row 1. But, mainly you just have to look at the symbols – here you can see were the top of the double crochet is, so its easy to see what direction the work is done.

Let’s start then, with the reading of the chart. We start in middle, and...

Start with: 4 ch joined with sl st.

Row 1 is written in black: ch 5, *dc 3, ch 2* 3 times, dc 2 and join with sl st in the 3rd chain from beginning of the row

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About Me

I am a Mom with five kids. I am also a crochet fanatic, and that is mostly what will be posted on here.(Maybe)
As a homeschooling mom, with five kids, addicted to crocheting, I always have something to do to keep me busy, and I like it that way-for the most part. I also love silence and stillness, which tends to pose a problem sometimes, as I don't seem to get to enjoy much of that.(Can you imagine why???) My hobbies are crocheting, writing, playing the flute, and singing. My husband, my children, my church, and my gifts and talents are Gods blessings that I hold dear in my life-treasures which fill my life to overflowing. Along with my crocheting, here I will share portions of my life, my thoughts, my hopes, and anything in between. Life is good, and my God is great.